21 April 2011

D'ORA & The OPIUM KIMONO

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from the Neue Galerie Exhibition

The power of the past and its influence on design is something we talk about here all the time.
How can it not be so? I appreciate the modern , the new-but let it be grounded in the firmament of history. For me-it doesn't count if it does not spring from the past.

Madeline Weinrib is always reaching back to create vibrant new designs from the past for modern life. Her Ikat textiles and carpets are saturated in updated rich color and their patterns evolve from her years of travel and diligence in working with the authentic and skilled craftsmen to stretch those contexts into the future. She does it like no other. I find her bespoke approach to be a unique one in the world of mass, mass, more, more. One of her ongoing collaborations is with Neue Galerie, here she creates a special kimono in the Opium pattern in celebration of their VIENNA 1900 Exhibition.

According to Neue Galerie the OPIUM KIMONO was inspired by the photograph of Viennese photographer Madame d'Ora. The Weinrib kimono fully reflects the mode of the photograph's Eastern influence. Viennese artists took Eastern influences for their own and indelibly marked them as theirs during the artistic Renaissance in early 20th century Vienna. The Opium pattern by Weinrib is exclusive to Neue Galerie and is woven from resist-dyed silk threads over many months.

Madame Dora Kallmuswas the first woman to be admitted to study theory at the Graphische Lehr- und Versuchsanstalt (Graphic Training Institute) & was also a member of the Vienna Photographic Society. Kallmus used the name "Madame d'Ora" professionally throughout her professional life and was a favorite of the aristocracy and celebrity in Vienna and Paris where she had studios. In 1940 Madame fled Paris when the Nazis invaded France.

story LINKS below:
the Opium Kimono is available at the Design Shop, Neue Galerie-here
the Exhibition runs through June 27 of this year, more informationhere
in the Galleryhere
Vienna 1900 art works here

I assume it will, one day, be established that one's marginal interest in the garments of our species is not why I visit this page. And here, dressed as a contextual illumination of the creation of garments, one finds yet another quite fundamental, if not almost fundamentalist, reason for visiting, in the phrase, "it doesn't count if it does not spring from the past." This seemingly arbitrary audacity is as close a formulation of the crisis of our time (it is said, all persons of middle age think so; but this is said by twits, whose blogs are all about us) as one can expect to find in a setting of such deference to others. For one's own part, this is not even a matter of opinion; it's one of logic. How can one expect to be the first itinerant on the frame of human life; and if one can, how can one conceive of what its many, many, many uses are, which one has not discovered?

The other day, the blogger offered one a pair of reading trousers. This was not only astute, it drew from experience one can't be alone in having. Certain trousers, by cut, size, and material, are inordinately more conducive to the suspended state of reading, than others; and forgive one for continuing to state the obvious.

But to hold one's interest, which is quite slender on the matter of trousering for others, somebody has to say to me, "I'm talking about questions of design and pleasure which are at least as ancient as the swaddling clothes of Moses."

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written by P. Gaye Tapp

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My book HOW THEY DECORATED, for Rizzoli, was published in April of 2017. I have been an interior designer for over 30 years & have an abiding passion for the original, & history. Little Augury was born on New Year's Eve 2008. It began as a way of continuing a conversation with a beloved mentor & the promise to keep just a bit of his wit & wisdom alive by sharing it whenever possible. Little Augury focuses on interior design, art, literature, fashion & social history with an eye, always looking back to the past, in hope of understanding what is authentic & what will endure & what connects us to our environment. Always listening for the footstep on the old stair-the sound of lives that walked that way.